EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Frederick Forsyth’s ‘glamorous, beautiful’ wife Sandy dies aged 76 after years-long battle with opioids that left him in despair

Although it’s more than 50 years since it first stunned British cinemagoers, The Day Of The Jackal generated a fresh flurry of camera flashes this week when Eddie Redmayne and co-stars Charles Dance and Lashana Lynch attended the London premiere of next month’s ten-part TV adaptation.

But there was one man whose attendance was particularly remarkable – Jackal author Frederick Forsyth, who wrote what fellow novelist Lee Child has called ‘the book that broke the mould’.

Remarkable because I can reveal that Forsyth was mourning Sandy, his wife of 30 years, who died on Saturday, more than four years after slipping into a remorseless decline that left him at his wits’ end.

From their home in Buckinghamshire, Forsyth tells me: ‘The first year and a half were here. Then, as her health deteriorated, she was carried out on a stretcher to the first in a chain of hospitals and care homes.’

 Frederick Forsyth and wife Sandy at The Almeida Theatre gala evening in Islington

Frederick Forsyth attends the UK Premiere of ‘The Day Of The Jackal’ at the Queen Elizabeth Hall on October 22, 2024

None of this was imaginable when, in 2018, Forsyth wrote his final thriller, The Fox.

Sandy, a former scriptwriter, was fiercely protective of her husband, then aged 80, as he kept to his publisher’s punishing schedule. 

But thereafter, he tells me, ‘the roles slowly reversed. Normally, the younger wife looks after the old codger. In our case, it was the other way round – Sandy was 76 to my 86’.

As Sandy moved from hospital to hospital, seeking one where her pain would be eliminated, Forsyth became aware of the awful truth: she’d succumbed to a form of hypochondria, convinced that she could only cope by consuming endless opioid painkillers.

‘She was shovelling them down. But they contained morphine. Far from curing her, they made her ill. Eventually broke her health completely.’

It’s a shattering end to a romance that began in 1989 after their first marriages had ended. ‘She was bright and glamorous, beautiful and full of life,’ recalls Forsyth.

Forsyth and partner Sandy Molloy attending the world premiere of The Time of Their Lives at Curzon Mayfair

Good in a crisis, are we Gina?

Gina Coladangelo, whose affair with Matt Hancock caused a crisis for Boris Johnson’s government, has a new job… in crisis management.

Hancock, 46, resigned as health secretary after CCTV showed him kissing and embracing Gina, his aide, at Whitehall in breach of Covid distancing restrictions in 2021. The pair were both married to other people.

Gina, 47, is an associate at Coulson Partners, the PR firm set up by ex-News Of The World editor Andy Coulson, where she will ‘support clients on… reputation management’.

Gina Coladangelo, whose affair with Matt Hancock caused a crisis for Boris Johnson’s government, has a new job… in crisis management

Strictly judge Shirley Ballas still in the money

Strictly Come Dancing may have lost a little sparkle, but head judge Shirley Ballas is still in the money. 

I hear she has waltzed up £1million in earnings at her firm Dance With Passion, where she channels her fees. 

Latest accounts reveal £900,000 in retained earnings (after subtracting bills of £124,000), and accumulated profits of £200,000 for the year to March. 

Shirley Ballas has waltzed up £1million in earnings at her firm Dance With Passion, where she channels her fees

Mamma Mia! Lily’s crooning the blues 

Lily James seems determined to follow the example of her fellow British actress Suki Waterhouse and become a pop star.

Surrey-born Lily, 35, made her music video debut earlier this year on Australian singer Ben Abraham’s track Never Been Better.

Now, the Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again star has recorded another duet, this time with the celebrated blues singer Eric Bibb on his latest number, Victory Voices.

Bibb, 73, describes their collaboration as ‘a gift to my soul’.

Former model Suki, 32, who co-starred with Lily in the 2016 film Pride And Prejudice And Zombies, released her debut studio album, I Can’t Let Go, in 2022, and performed as a supporting act for Taylor Swift at Wembley Stadium in August.

British actress Lily James has recorded a song with veteran blues star Eric Bibb from her Instagram

Surrey-born Lily, 35, made her music video debut earlier this year on Australian singer Ben Abraham’s track Never Been Better

Poirot star retracing Agatha Christie voyage

Poirot star Sir David Suchet travelled across Hawaii, New Zealand and South Africa for a new TV series retracing a 1922 voyage taken by Agatha Christie. 

‘I was learning about the character of a young lady who loved surfing, who loved socialising. 

She was vivacious,’ Suchet enthuses. ‘On the ship, she openly writes in her diary that she was kept up into the early hours with one of the officers on board. She was a little bit flirty. I wish I’d met her.’ 

Sir David Suchet and Sheila Ferris on day ten of the 2024 Wimbledon Championships at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, London

Is Country Life editor Mark Hedges barking mad? 

He’s put an image of the cartoon character Snoopy on the cover of the hunting, shooting and fishing set’s house journal. 

Its latest edition details the palatial lives of country house dogs, including the kennels at Goodwood where pampered pooches had central heating a century before their owners. 

‘Snoopy was my hero as a teenager,’ Hedges says. ‘He made sense of the world, sitting on his kennel with his friend Woodstock. So 40 years on, I am delighted that my hero is on the cover.’ 

Mark Hedges Country Life Editor has put an image of the cartoon character Snoopy on the cover of the hunting, shooting and fishing set’s house journal

Nat spooks up early! 

Like the run-up to Christmas, Halloween seems to get earlier every year.

Sky Sports host Natalie Pinkham, 47, right, says her family celebrated this week before jetting off to Mexico so she can cover the F1 Grand Prix

Sky Sports host Natalie Pinkham, 47, right, says her family celebrated this week before jetting off to Mexico so she can cover the F1 Grand Prix.

Neighbours could have taken fright at her spooky wig, black lippy and the fake blood running from her eye, but she adds: ‘They were all really sweet about it.’